I love stories that end at the beginning.
I have always favored a cyclic life to an unending one. Think vampires. Pale hunky teenage immortals with dark sex appeal as Hollywood would have it. The abilities are cool but longevity does not entice me because existing forever seems dreadfully boring. And if you‘re not a psychopath who turns everyone into vampires, your friends would always die and leave you all alone.
Werewolves on the other hand, live short lives with abilities and die off leaving their children to carry on in their stead. There’s continuity but not quite immortality. As Emma Stone’s ‘Gwen Stacey’ says in a touching valedictory speech on ‘The Amazing Spider-Man 2’, “What make life precious is that it ends”.
In pockets of devilish idleness, I have often wondered if that primal biological need by animals to mate and essentially pass on a part of themselves is just an ungracious attempt at immortality. So that, in the end, no matter the journey, we’re all one person. The first person.
This is how circular stories progress. You start somewhere and all your steps lead you right back to the beginning, changed and yet the same. I love it. Some of my favorite stories take this route.
Episode 14 of the Netflix sci fi anthology series ‘Love Death & Robots’ is about a great artist who’s an Android named Zima Blue. Zima was made to be a pool cleaning machine before his evolution. He would go on to make amazing art, graduating from using walls to moons to nebulas as canvas. He invites a journalist to witness his greatest art piece ever. There’s great anticipation. His final piece? What does he have in store? An artist who has painted the very stars, what more could he do? In a recreation of the original pool which he cleaned, Zima returns to his first form as a pool machine, losing his sentience and simply...cleaning.
It seems to be the journey we all must take. We evolve along the way. Futile, when you think about ending up where you started but the journey is the true reason a beginning or an end is worth it.
Kanye West for example has completed a 360 musically. The genius who started out as church boy rapping about Jesus goes through a school session of college music, the emotional throes of 808’s, the dark fantasies and angry Yeezus era, to family man and troubled one right back to Sunday service to tell us once again that Jesus is king.
I’ve also fancied rebirth as the best kind of immortality like a version of DC’s Hawk man and Hawk woman who are star crossed lovers that die only to be reborn to find one another again, over and over as new people. It’s fascinating like the fabled Phoenix who lives a full life then bursts into flames to start all over again. In my books, straight immortality that never takes breaks or pause will never compare. I’d rather be the jellyfish that turns itself inside out and becomes a new creature again. A cyclical life is the sweetest. And stories of that nature are always fun to witness.
I remember a rather awkward conversation I once had with my dear mother about paradise. I was always anxious to find out that no evil would exist anymore in that perfect world because we had one perfect world before and evil crept in nonetheless. What was to stop it this time? I‘d rather not delve into theology but instead a fantasy of mine. I believe life will always come in cycles. Everything we’re seeing now, we’ve seen before and we’ll see again.
Like the Norse mythology version of Armageddon. Ragnorok. The end of the gods. It seems a sad story with favorites like Thor, Odin, Hemdall and others dying but teachings show that two survivors shall always remain who rise from the ruins of a dead people to forge ahead and restart the cycle of life. So Ragnorok is not just the end of the Vikings, it is their beginning too.
Everything comes in cycles when examined. Brings to mind the different cycles I learnt about in secondary school like carbon and nitrogen and how the processes would always come full circle.
The earth itself follows this pattern with its steady revolution round the sun even while it rotates on its own axis giving us day and night and day and night and day again as the clock moves round and round. Cycles inside cycles inside cycles.
This is my first post on this blog and as you must have garnered, it is about stories in all forms. It‘s about the here to there. It is about beginnings and ends and the beautiful journey. So stay with me now, don’t be scared. When all this is done, one day the last entry of this blog will be its first cause it’ll be me before you saying:
I love stories that begin at the end.
All art is by Jindu. You can find him on IG: @pro.dr3amer.
Don’t forget to subscribe and tell your friends. ; )
Everything we’re seeing now, we’ve seen before and we’ll see again.
I love this line
It’s beautiful when a thought of yours is being explained by someone else.. this is just beautiful